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38 GOLF COURSE MANAGEMENT 07.17
The riding helmet that David Beanblossom
wore on the day of his catastrophic harness racing
accident shows dents incurred from the collision with a
guardrail. Photo courtesy of David Beanblossom
When he peers into the
bathroom mirror, David Bean
-
blossom reflects on his past. It
isn't pretty. The 8-inch, half-
oval-shaped scar on his left cheek
is, as he describes it, "big and gnarly."
More than four decades ago, as
Beanblossom's family was traveling home
on rain-soaked State Road 135 in Brown
-
stown, Ind., disaster struck. David, then
only 8, sat wedged in the Buick's front seat
between his father, Jim, and mother, Anna.
His sister, Sherry, was in the back seat with
a friend. A pickup truck coming around a
curve lost control and smashed into the
Beanblossoms head-on.
"Nobody wore seat belts then. My head
ended up between the gas and brake ped
-
als. That's how I got the gash on my cheek,"
says Beanblossom, who suffered the most
serious injuries. "Mom held me in her lap
like a baby, and she pressed a handkerchief
against my face to stop the bleeding. I was
unconscious. When I woke up and saw the
blood, I passed out again."
The scar serves as a poignant reminder
to him that life is fragile. That every day is
a gift. It also shows that he is a survivor —
something he would prove over and over.
"I should have been dead twice over,"
he says.
The second time he was spared — 15
years ago — would be a real life-changer.
A successful harness racing driver, Bean
-
blossom was catapulted 20 feet in the air
during a race and was left bloody and man
-
gled after the mishap. At least one person
thought he was a goner.
As is his style, though, Beanblossom re
-
grouped. "I cheated death," he says.
The golf course industry should be
thankful that Beanblossom cheats. Facing
a crossroads in his life following that per
-
ilous ordeal in 2002, he gave up harness
racing. In one of those it-was-meant-to-be
scenarios, Beanblossom eventually landed a
job as an $8-an-hour crew member at Char
-
iot Run Golf Club in Laconia, Ind., whose
logo depicts a horse pulling a passenger in a
chariot. The faceless figure in the logo may
as well be him.
"Isn't that the craziest thing?" Bean-
blossom says.
Crazy, it appears, works. "Our course is
in fantastic shape. It comes from the drive
David has," says Jeff Krohn, PGA profes
-
sional and director of golf at Chariot Run.
Beanblossom, a 10-year GCSAA mem
-
ber, was a late-bloomer and a quick riser in
the profession. He did not work on a golf
course until 2006, when he was 39, yet
Beanblossom had played the game (he's
an 8 handicap) and, after becoming estab
-
lished at Chariot Run, took online turfgrass
courses through Penn State. In 2011, he was
named Chariot Run's head superintendent.
Beanblossom, schooled by faith, has cer
-
tainly defied the odds in life's journey.
"I think everything that happened to me
happened for a reason. It happened to put
me where I am right now. I am lucky to be
anywhere," says Beanblossom, 50.
Driving force
Most 18-year-olds have their license.
Not many of them, though, have this type
of license.
At 18, Beanblossom earned a pari-mu
-
tuel license to participate as a harness racing
driver in events in which betting was per
-
mitted. Early on, you could have wagered
that Beanblossom would eventually pursue
this line of work. It was all he knew, re
-
ally. The family farm in Indiana — on the
Ohio River and 45 minutes west of Louis
-
ville — featured Standardbred horses and a
half-mile oval training track that included
banked turns. After school, Beanblossom
would clean stalls and jog horses. "Some
-
thing about the horses I fell in love with,"
he says. "It was fun. I liked the reward of
preparing them to race."
Jim Beanblossom, 84, knew the young
-
est of his four children had a knack for
horses. "If you were afraid of one, you might
as well forget about it — they knew it. But
he got along with them," Jim says. "David's
always been smart. Whatever he did, he did
the best he could, I'll put it that way."
David wasted no time showing that he
belonged on the harness racing circuit. In
July 1984, not long after obtaining his li
-
cense, Beanblossom won his very first race
on a horse named She's Hilarious. "She was
petite, not much bigger than a Great Dane,
and as red as the ace of hearts," he says.
Although he didn't know it at the time,
Beanblossom was establishing traits that
would prepare him to be a superintendent.
"Working with horses and turfgrass is so
much alike that it's scary," he says. "With
horses, as you do with turfgrass, you come
up with a plan of attack, you nurture every
day, and you're working on ways of peaking
the golf course, whether it's for an event or a
certain time of the year."
Harness racing became a serious money
-
making proposition for Beanblossom, who